Love On Sunday – a Rachel Shred mount – steps up sharply in distance to 2000 metres following his last start effort over 1400 metres in the Cairns Amateur Sprint on September 9.

Alex Malliff is overlooking the defeat after the six-year-old beat only one runner home behind the Lindsay Gough -trained Constant Flight.

"He's been a great buy after I got him for $5,000 at an Inglis online auction about 18 months ago," Malliff said.

"He's now won seven races for us and more than $100,000 in prize money.

"He had no luck in Cairns where he drew awkwardly and was caught wide.

"After he jumped he looked like getting some cover but they kicked up inside him and he was caught three and four deep."

Love On Sunday was Malliff's first runner in the Atherton Cup last year when he was narrowly beaten by the Janel Ryan-trained Fast Train.

"He was beaten a lip by a better horse on the day last year and there were no excuses," Malliff said. 

"But, I think he's going a lot better this year after he won well two starts back at Home Hill and was very unlucky in Cairns last time."

Malliff is keen to qualify Love On Sunday for the Country Cups Challenge Final in Brisbane in December but is looking for a suitable qualifying race.

"I think this race was a qualifying race last year but it's not now so I'll have to find a qualifying race somewhere," Malliff said.

Malliff remains a full-time trainer with a team of 17 horses in work after turning down a job opportunity six months ago to work for the Mareeba Shire Council.

"I was offered a job with the council about six months ago but I turned it down after I ended up getting more horses to train," Malliff said.

Malliff has only been training for seven years and is best known as the trainer of former cult hero Paniagua.

Paniagua was the winner of the Country Cups Challenge Final at Doomben in 2020.